One of the main advantages of our prepared environment is the opportunity for children to move freely! Children engage with the materials as long as they want and are able to choose activities that perfect different skills – all while they think they are playing!

As Phase-In seems to be coming to an end, children seem less worried about not having you around and are more attracted to the materials displayed in our environment. This week, Practical Life was a very busy area. Spooning, transferring, opening and closing, twisting, threading, posting, and more, are exercises that help your child’s development of the hand and prepare them for future writing. In fact, Practical Life activities are the core of a Montessori toddler classroom. They are the most important exercises for developing order, concentration, coordination, and independence during the first years of life. They are also essential for later learning and life in general.

Curiosity is in the air and desire for vocabulary enrichment is evident. Children enjoy asking us to name objects in the environment. The basket of fruits and the “fall basket” were popular works. Thank you for all your donations of mini pumpkins, gourds and Indian corn. Children seem to enjoy touching, smelling, and observing them! Some of our friends have even playfully tasted them.

This week we welcomed a new student to our class. We are so excited to have her as part of our community!

“Polar Bear, Polar Bear What do You Hear” by Eric Carle was your children’s favorite book this week. We have also introduced a new song called “Let’s Go Swimming” by Laurie Bekner Band and your children just loved it! If you have a chance to check the song out, I am sure you will have fun too! Enjoy shaking your tails with your little ones!

~Parent & Teacher Conferences are coming up!

Parent & Teacher Conferences are on Thursday, October 25^th. 

This is to a wonderful time to learn about your child’s progress; it is strongly encouraged that parents attend.  The online Parent & Teacher sign-up will be live on Monday, October 8^th – please look for more information in Monday’s School News about scheduling your Parent & Teacher Conference online.  If you are unavailable to meet with your child’s teacher on October 25^th, please email your child’s teacher directly about scheduling another day or time that week for a conference.

Our phase-in process continues to be a success. Children have been busy exploring the environment and getting familiar with their new routines and peers.

This week we had the opportunity to start working on walking together as a group outside of the classroom with some of our students. We practiced through the halls of the school the importance of walking slowly and safely, staying together and following the teacher. We encourage you to practice this at home as well. Walking with your child outdoors is a great opportunity for them to work on this skill.

We visited our Administrators’ offices t0 brighten their day with the smiles and hellos from your children. We also visited the Zen garden and spent time observing the bunnies. We explored the space, felt the rocks, and touched the leaves from the trees.  It was just so fun for your children!  We also had the opportunity to visit the playground on one occasion, where we shared an outdoor snack together and had some fun in the sand. Getting familiar with new surroundings is a big job for these little ones and we continue to appreciate your support through this process.

Your children have started to settle in little by little. There are less tears everyday at drop off time and more dancing and giggles throughout the morning. As your children’s confidence and trust have increased, they have started to explore the environment more intentionally. They have even started to socialize with some of their peers. Those that are able to say a few words have started to recognize and call their friends by their names. Your children have also been socializing with different adults from our staff team, so they can feel more confident and safe when these adults enter and visit us in our classroom.

As the children continue to use their freedom of movement and freedom of choice, some ground rules have been introduced. One of those rules is: Respect for other’s work. In traditional school settings children this age are encouraged and even expected to share. Sharing is a very important concept, but for children of this age it’s a task that they are not developmentally ready for. In our environment we encourage the concept of taking turns instead. This encourages patience, mindfulness, independence, order, and concentration. Children don’t feel threatened by the idea that another child will take their material away, instead they can peacefully work with the material until they are done. When children want to work independently we encourage them to say: “This is my work. Please don’t touch.” We also encourage the children to observe quietly how other children are working with a material. It’s so fun to see that even at this young age children are able to work on mastering these skills! They just need the encouragement to do so.

Another rule we introduced this week is: We Respect our Materials.  As guides, we model slowly and consistently throughout the morning the importance of carrying and handling our materials in a gentle way. If one of our students decides to throw a piece of material across the room, we encourage him/her to use one of the balls instead and we verbalize to them in a few words how we should use the materials.  “We throw the ball.” “We are gentle with our materials.”

On another note, the children’s favorite book this week was: “Brown Bear, Brown Bear What do You See?” By Eric Carle. “We are the Dinosaurs” by Laurie Berkner continues to be the number one hit on our music list this week!

We are excited for a new month and all the fun we are about to have! Stay tuned and enjoy the pictures of your beautiful children!